Skyrim: Ashwolf's Journey
by Tanicus Caesareth
Summary: What happens when the universes of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and the Pokemon anime combine? Find out as you embark on an epic journey with Ashwolf Beast-Catcher, Brokenspire the Stone, and more; traversing through the vast expanses of Skyrim, the war-torn tundra providence of Tamriel! Rated T for violence in some chapters, although it's still a work-in-progress, so who knows? ;)
1. Chapter 1

**Hello! This is my first real attempt at a Pokemon story, let alone a crossover with The Elder Scrolls, so please do let me know if there's anything I can improve!**

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**A quick warning: many aspects of the Pokemon anime universe, including characters and settings, have been (for the most part) modified to fit with The Elder Scrolls universe. All of the characters here are older, and some characters you have grown to know and love may or may not have been turned into lizard people; and therefore you may not agree with how I have envisioned them. Some pairings may be hinted at.  
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**If any of this offends you for any reason, please turn back now.**

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"I'm late! I'm late! By Oblivion I'm late!" the voice of a young Nord echoed through the forest. Fallen leaves and twigs snapped beneath his heavy iron boots as he frantically ran through the woods, ducking beneath the low branches of the snow-tipped trees every now and again. He was lost in every which way, with no sense of direction whatsoever, and the sun was already beginning to set in the clouded sky. "I'm never going to forgive myself if I can't make it in time! I just… can't…" he wheezed, exhausted and out of breath. As he fell to his knees in desperation, a wooden shack in the distance caught his eye…

"Praise be to Talos!" he said as he slowly stood up on his weary bones and pressed onward. When he reached the old ramshackle hut, he gave a knock at the door, the sound of his iron gauntlet banging on the wood reverberating through the forest around him. "Come on, I know you're in there…" he said in an irritated and impatient tone as he began to knock harder.

"Are you a soldier?" the voice of an old man called out from behind the door. The Nord outside could have sworn that he heard the sound of a dagger being unsheathed. He lowered his hand and silently wrapped it around the handle of the battle-axe on his back.

"Relax, it's just Ashwolf…" the Nord said, his voice low.

"Ashwolf who?" the old man said, a hint of suspicion in his voice. Ashwolf was certain now that the old codger had a blade in his grasp, as he now heard the slow, screeching clank of metal scraping against the door.

"Ashwolf Beast-Catcher," Ashwolf replied, growing tired of the old man's distrustful antics. He rapped his fingers on the hilt of his weapon impatiently.

"Oh," the elder said in a relieved tone. There was a slight pause, and Ashwolf could hear the man's weapon being sheathed over the sound of his pained breathing. "Come on in," he said as he opened the door with a smile, the wrinkles in his face scrunching up like a dry leaf. The man was a short, white-haired Breton, scrawny to the bone. He had prominent claw marks over his left eye, along with other little nicks on his face. "You're lucky I'm still willing to be so charitable, you arriving so late… After all, I have many other eager students, and a limited supply of spellbooks," he said as he narrowed his brow.

"I know, I know, I just got a little… eh, sidetracked…" Ashwolf said as he rubbed the back of his neck nervously. "Thank you for having me, Oakharth," he said as he pushed the door open a little wider and stepped through, the combination of his strength and the near-ruined state of the door causing one if its hinges to break from the frame.

"Ah, call me Sabatolf. And don't mind the door… Sooner or later this whole thing is going to come down on top of me," Sabatolf said with a sigh. "Now, you brought the septims, correct? You are aware that I'm not a charity…" Sabatolf said as he shakily pulled a rusted key out of one of the pockets of his torn robe and opened an equally rusted chest. He smiled as the lid opened with a slight clank.

"Of course, Sabatolf. Let me just find it…" Ashwolf said as he dug through his knapsack. At last, he pulled out a small red bag full of coins, tied off with a piece of twine. It jangled as he handed it to Sabatolf. "You're still going to teach me how to summon the atronach, right?"

"Well, you have to learn the spell first," Sabatolf said with a chuckle. He took the bag of septims, weighed it in his hand, and tossed it behind him onto the table with a shrug. "Now, you look through this chest of spell tomes and pick out one you like," he said with a slight sarcastic sneer as he pointed over to the ancient chest. It appeared to be empty, except for one lone book lying at the bottom.

The sound of Ashwolf's heavy iron boots tolled through the shack as he walked over to the chest, his hands trembling in anticipation. He had been eagerly awaiting the day when he would finally be able to conjure an atronach to aid him in battle. Talos knows that he certainly needed one more than once during his travels…

The floorboards creaked and Ashwolf's heart raced as he eagerly reached his hand into the chest that had once been full of many spell tomes. He pulled out the lone book and read the cover. "Hmm… _'Summon Storm Atronach'_…" he read aloud, turning the book over in his hands. He looked up at Sabatolf, who was sitting at the table, eagerly counting out his coins. "Don't you have any flame atronachs? Or frost atronachs..?"

Sabatolf closed his eyes, threw his head back, and began laughing heartily as he held his stomach. "Maybe, if you hadn't gotten here so late!" he said in between his fits of laughter. "Boy, do you honestly expect anything more than the bottom of the barrel, arriving two hours late to such an event? You should consider yourself lucky, that was the only book of its kind in the whole chest."

"I guess not, but…" Ashwolf said with a slight pause. "Why did nobody pick this one?"

"Not quite sure… But that's your only option. Take it or leave it," Sabatolf said as he returned to counting the septims he had just earned. He closely examined each one to test its authenticity. As he counted the last one, he swept all of the coins into a strongbox and locked it.

"Seeing as that I came all the way out here and spent every last septim I had, I guess I have no choice," Ashwolf said as he wiped the dust off of the antique book with his arm. "So, do I just have to read it?"

"You just have to read it," Sabatolf said, his gaze locked on a torn journal lying on his desk. The pages were heavily yellowed, showing great age. Every now again, he would glance at the troll skull resting at the corner of the small, rustic table and write something down.

Ashwolf took a seat on a small chair and began to flip through the pages of the spell tome. He quickly grew bored and began to skim through the book, eventually to a point where he was barely reading the pages. He never was one for reading. "Do I have to read all of it?" he called out to Sabatolf with a slight whine.

"Yes. All of it. And don't think you can skim through it either!" Sabatolf shouted from across the room in reply, still focused on his journal.

Ashwolf sighed and flipped back through the book and closely read the pages he had skimmed. The two men must have been very focused on their reading, for neither one of them heard the voices of men in the distance…

"I've finished! Now will you teach me how to use the spell?" Ashwolf hollered as he read the last words of the tome. He slamming the book shut, feeling a slight sense of victory. Dust flew from the pages.

"Yes, now, come with me and I'll teach you to-" Sabatolf said. He was cut off by hollering and the sounds of clattering metal outside.

"OPEN THIS DOOR!" one of the men shouted. "OR ELSE I'LL OPEN IT MYSELF!" this prompted a slight chuckle from the other men.

"Yeah, but if you did that, the whole place would topple down!" another man roared. They all exploded with laughter at his comment.

"Soldiers!" Sabatolf whispered in a harsh, worried tone. His voice was quivering, and with all of the ruckus outside, his voice was near impossible to hear. "There are soldiers out there! Get down!" he said as he fell from his chair onto the floor, wincing with pain as he hit the splintery wood. He moved under the table and curled up into a ball. He was shaking profusely with fear. Ashwolf slowly began to follow suit, but before he was able to make his way to the floor, the soldiers had already smashed through the door. Terrified, Ashwolf froze up, his eyes wide. He continued to hold the spell book tightly in his trembling hands. Half of the soldiers made their way over to Ashwolf, the others making their way toward Sabatolf, weapons drawn. His heart was beating so quickly, it was as if it was about to explode.

The soldiers roughly grabbed Ashwolf by the arms and hoisted him out of the chair. They stood in front of him, shouting. But the sounds of screaming masked their voices. He heard metal smashing against flesh. Bones crunching. Slow breathing… He couldn't see what was going on, but based on what he had heard; Ashwolf thanked Talos that the soldiers were blocking his view. It felt as if time had stopped.

"Come on, Stormcloak filth! You're coming with us! To the chopping block you go!" one of the men shouted as the others hooted and dragged Ashwolf out the door. Ashwolf saw some of them kick Sabatolf's bashed, mangled carcass as they passed by.

"Ashwolf… Ashwolf Beast-Catcher…" Sabatolf whispered, his little remaining life now quickly draining from him. "Use that atronach well." he said before one of the soldiers abruptly shoved a dagger in his side. The man took Sabatolf's old strongbox full of money and followed the others out the door and into the snowy forest. The blood that coated the men's boots stained the snow.

Ashwolf clenched his fists. He swore by Talos that he would avenge Sabatolf Oakharth's death if it was the last thing he did. The emotional toll clouded his mind. The only thing he could think of was hate. The hate burned in his mind. It burned in his throat. It burned in his eyes as the tears slowly fell down his face and into his ragged black beard. The horrible feeling of hate and loss burned in his clenched fists… But no matter how much it hurt, he knew he had to stay silent…

After being dragged through the snow for seemingly hours, the soldiers giving no mind to Ashwolf's grunts as his knees banged against rocks and tree branches scraped across his face, he finally spoke. His voice came out in a slight squeak, the lump in his throat preventing him from talking very loudly. "What do you even want with me? Why did you kill that man? Have you no remorse?"

"We have no remorse for Stormcloaks," a soldier said, his eyes locked on the path ahead.

"We aren't bloody Stormcloaks! You just murdered an innocent man! Admit it!" Ashwolf roared, his eyes filling with tears.

"Should have thought about that before you crossed the border into Skyrim," another said. It was obvious that he hadn't been paying attention to what was going on.

"I bet you cowards couldn't take on a deer," he said with a slight smirk, although his words had no joking or sarcastic tone in them.

"Well then I guess that makes you weaker than a deer," one of the soldiers spat back as he continued to drag Ashwolf through the woods along with his brothers. They chuckled at his comment.

Ashwolf's rage could no longer be contained. He thrashed in the soldiers arms. He bit them and kicked them and shouted at the top of his voice. The rage pounded in his ears, blocking out the soldier's shouting. Fed up with their captor's protest, the men flung Ashwolf to the ground and kicked him until he passed out…

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**Well? What did you think? The next chapter is on the way, so stay tuned and enjoy!**


	2. Chapter 2

**Hello! Here's the next chapter. What will become of poor Ashwolf? Read and find out!**

**EDIT: If you read this chapter within the first half-an-hour or so of it being published and are now currently scratching your head in utmost confusion, just know that I made a bit of an oopsie. For some reason, a few paragraphs got cut out, but it's all good now. Most of you probably wouldn't have known if I hadn't added this, but I just want to make sure.**

**On with the chapter!**

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"Where in Oblivion am I..?" Ashwolf mumbled as his eyes slowly fluttered open. His vision was very hazy, but he could make out the figure of a masked man in front of him. As his vision slowly became more clear, he could now see that the man was holding a massive axe, the blade glistening in the afternoon sun. "W-what? No! No, no, no, no, no!" he shouted, now free from his dazed state and fully aware of what was happening. He was about to be beheaded! He desperately wriggled his hands before realizing they were tied up.

"Silence, prisoner!" an Imperial captain shouted, her face fixed in a scowl colder than the Throat of the World. She gave Ashwolf a swift kick in the side, to which he gave a slight grunt. "Off with his head, and make it quick! I haven't got all day!"

As instructed, the executioner raised his weapon high above his head, blocking out the sun from Ashwolf's perspective.

"I'm sorry, my brother… At least you will die in your homeland," a man nearby to him whispered. He showed genuine pain in his eyes, like he was the only one who knew that Ashwolf shouldn't have been there.

Taking a deep breath, the executioner swung his mighty axe downward. Ashwolf squeezed his eyes shut in terror. "Talos save me…" he whispered in prayer. Just then, a mighty roar sounded off from the heavens. Ashwolf's eyes shot open, startled from the earth-shattering sound. Perhaps his prayer had been answered? He crossed his fingers, hoping that this would give him an opportunity to escape from death's cold grasp.

The blade stopped inches above his neck as the roar sounded off again. Suddenly, there was a very loud crash. The executioner was knocked to the ground from the resulting shockwave. Looking up at the tower in the distance, he saw a sight he almost couldn't believe: a mighty dragon was perched atop of the stone bricks, shooting fire from his scaly maw!

"But… I thought the dragons were long gone!" he said under his breath. Suddenly, he realized his golden opportunity to escape. As the soldiers raised their bows and readied their weapons, he sawed through the ropes that constricted his hands with the fallen executioner's blade, and then ran for his life into a small tower, relatively untouched by the dragon's flames. He made his way into the old stone building, flames seeping through the holes in the withering walls.

"Wha? Who's there?" said a man sitting on the floor of the building, looking around nervously. His eyes were pure white, and he had faded scars over them. He was clearly old and blind, and his hearing was likely the next thing to go, considering that he didn't realize the commotion going on outside.

"What are you doing here? Get up! There's a dragon attacking!" Ashwolf shouted.

"Dragon my foot! What's next, Talos is eating sweet rolls with that bloody Ulfric Stormcloak?" the old man said. He began to wheeze. "Do you smell that? Smells like smoke…"

"Yes, it is smoke! And that's because there's a DRAGON OUTSIDE!" Ashwolf hollered, waving his arms to try and emphasize his point before remembering that the man was blind.

"What? Speak up!" he managed to say through his violent coughing fits.

"Ugh, never mind. I'm getting you out of here," Ashwolf said as he made his way over to the man sitting by the wall. He hoisted him over his shoulder and clomped up the stairs, his hand over his mouth to keep him from accidentally inhaling the thick black smoke that clouded the room.

"What are you doing? Put me down! Put me down!" the man yelped, squirming desperately to try and break free from Ashwolf's grip. He still had quite a lot of strength left in him, and he was surprisingly heavy.

"I'm saving you. Unless you want to get burned up by that monster outside, I'm not putting you down," Ashwolf said with a smile, amused by the old bloke's behavior

"I don't have anything to live for! I'm a blind old bum that lives in a tower! Don't risk it, kid!" he yelled, his words becoming slightly more melancholy in tone.

"Well, if we get out of here alive, you won't have to live in a tower. That's a start," Ashwolf said with a slight chuckle as he finally reached the top of the keep. By then, he was panting heavily. Wearing heavy armor certainly didn't help in this case. Taking a deep breath, he charged toward the other side of the roof.

"Wait! Stop! Where are we going? Aaaaaaah!" the old man screamed in horror as Ashwolf leapt off of the stone roof, crashing through the charred and partially collapsed roof of a house below. Ashwolf surprisingly landed on his feet with a heavy thud, kicking up the ashes that covered the floor. He continued to run through the burning building, dodging falling boards and flaming piles of wood as he made his way to an opening in the scorched wall.

Ashwolf stumbled outside, continuing to charge relatively unshaken. He weaved through the soldiers and escaped prisoners as he made his way to a nearby mountain.

"Prisoner! Stop!" an enraged guard shouted as he lashed at Ashwolf with his blade, barely slicing the tip of his ear.

Another guard came up behind him and grabbed him, saying; "There is no time to worry about the prisoners! They'll probably be killed by either the dragon or the wilderness anyway!"

Ashwolf said a silent prayer as he ran toward the snow tipped mountains in the distance, the blind man still slung over his shoulder. By then, the poor old soul had stopped his protest; either because he was too tired or he just gave up. But as he made his way up the highland, Ashwolf confirmed that it was the latter, as he heard light snoring behind his back. How the old man could sleep as Ashwolf clomped up the steep rocks, he was unsure, but at least he was at peace.


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